Ford Motor’s U.S. auto sales  plunged -15.6% in 2020, due to the impact of the coronavirus pandemic, a decrease in commercial fleet sales, and lower inventories of its F-150 pickup trucks.

Fourth quarter sales of the full-size pickup fell -33% year-over-year, amid factory shutdowns last spring due to Covid-19 as well as a changeover in production of the facilities to produce the redesigned F-150.

“We’re optimizing the production at both plants right now and it’s a matter of getting more F-150s out to our dealer lots,” Erich Merkle, Ford’s head of U.S. sales analysis, told CNBC.He said inventories of the F-150 were 141,000 units as of end last year, compared to  267,000 a year earlier.

The company’s truck sales fell -11.3% in 2020.

(according to a CNBC report) The closures are a part of a previously announced plan by Macy’s to shut 125 locations by 2023.The company plans to concentrate on best performing malls and even smaller stores away from malls.

In 2020, Macy’s closed about 30 locations

Currently, Macy’s operates 544 of its namesake department stores, 34 Bloomingdale’s locations, 19 Bloomingdale’s outlets and 166 Bluemercury shops, according to its website

I ran a scan of S&P 500 stocks on January 6, and 320 members of the index have weekly stochastics readings above 70.The rally in the overall market over the last few months has created the current situation.

Each month I build a list of stocks that meet certain fundamental requirements and then I keep an eye on the weekly charts, trying to find a good entry point to buy the stocks that I am interested in.

 

The analyst mentioned that current retail momentum lags consensus expectations for the fourth quarter, and earnings estimates for 2021 are at risk.According to him, data is indicative of another quarter of under-shipments.

Lavery  also warned that there is adequate space for competition, and said that new entrants “can both validate the category with consumers and help build broader visibility.” According to him, while Beyond Meat has an opportunity at McDonald’s, that’s not providing great brand visibility.

While the decision will need a confirmation by the European Commission, it still leads to region-wise vaccine distribution in the coming days.

Ursula von der Leyen, president of the European Commission, said in a statement that the Moderna vaccine would allow the EU to have an additional 160 million doses.The European Medicines Agency said the biotech's mRNA 1273 vaccine is "another tool to overcome the current emergency", after the Pfizer-BioNTech Covid vaccine.

The decision will need a confirmation by the European Commission

 

Tesla Inc. shares got a price target boost from analysts at Morgan Stanley.

Morgan Stanley analyst Adam Jonas increased his price target on the electric carmaker’s stock by $270, to $810 per share.According to Jonas, the clean-energy carmaker is  the industry's "chosen one" due to the company’s people, its technology, business model and access to capital.

Jonas also mentioned that Tesla has “no entanglement with the environmental liabilities that burden legacy competition" .

The deal is expected to close in the second half of 2021.

The acquisition will see Change Healthcare combining with UnitedHealth’s OptumInsight unit to offer data analytics, software and other services to the health-care industry.

According to the two companies, the deal will help simplify services around medical care and lower costs.

Private-equity funds affiliated with Blackstone Group that own about 20% of Change Healthcare’s common stock have agreed to vote in favor of the deal.The deal is expected to increase UnitedHealth’s adjusted per-share earnings by 50 cents in 2022, the companies said.

European markets have been rallying nicely over the last few months with a number of countries seeing sharp rallies off their October lows.Those same three ETFs all have “sell” ratings on the Tickeron Scorecard currently as well.

The EWU saw a recent surge when it was announced that there was a Brexit deal in place for England to leave the European Union.

Bitcoin  briefly fell below $30,000 Monday, just two days after topping  that level for the first time.

The cryptocurrency rallied to edge past the $34,000 mark during the weekend.But it was still down more than -5%.

Bitcoin had a historic, more than +300% rally in 2020.

But the volatility in the crypto market has been quite apparent from time to time, with the latest intra-day roller-coaster in bitcoin probably a result of short-term profit taking by investors, among other potential factors.

 

Harned  lowered his rating on the aircraft maker’s shares to underperform from market perform.He also cut his share-price target to $199 from $221.

“We had seen Boeing as fairly valued since the stock rose after announcements on high efficacy vaccines for covid-19,” Harned wrote in a commentary.  Harned mentioned that while the  737 MAX is now in service and deliveries have restarted, it is slightly behind the analyst’s forecast.

He also said that the five-year delivery and free cash flow outlook was only about half of his team’s 2018 outlook.

The analyst also pointed out that recently the 787 "has come under more pressure, which we do not believe the market fully appreciates.” This led him to lower  2020-21 free-cash flow estimates. "We estimate 787 issues could significantly hurt free cash flow through cost of repairs, compensation to customers, timing of engine cash payments, and less operating leverage",  Harned noted .

Industrial technology company Teledyne Technologies  agreed to acquire thermal image technology company FLIR Systems.

In the cash-and-stock deal valued at approximately $8 billion,  FLIR shareholders will receive $28 a share in cash and 0.0718 a share of Teledyne common stock for each FLIR share.The deal implies  a 40% premium for FLIR stockholders based on FLIR’s 30-day volume weighted average price as of Dec. 31.

The transaction is expected to close in the middle of 2021, subject to regulatory approvals.

In a year literally plagued with bad news and uncertainties about public health, social unrest, and a political crisis, the stock market posted robust returns.From an investment standpoint, the strength across many asset classes has led to a surge in “FOMO,” or fear of missing out on returns.

Many investors are rushing into the markets, pushing sentiment from pessimistic in the spring to optimistic today.

Despite the low trading volume and lack of excitement, there were three different semiconductor companies that saw bullish signals generated by Tickeron’s A.I.dvisor.The signals all three showed very high confidence levels for a move higher in the next month.

Microchip Technology (MCHP), Texas Instruments (TXN), and Xilinx (XLNX) all saw bullish signals generated on December 30 and the signals showed confidence levels of 88% and 89%.

All three stocks have seen big gains since the March low, but all three have also experienced small downturns in the last few weeks.

Digging deeper in to the companies and their fundamentals, the Tickeron Fundamental Analysis Screener shows a number of positive signs for all three.

It also mentioned that  upstream liquid-fuels pricing could increase earnings by as much as $400 million.Margins in its chemicals business could see an increase between $200 million and $400 million.

On the other hand, the company mentioned that downstream refining margins could range between a negative $100 million to a positive $100 million increase while mark-to-market derivatives could negatively affect earnings by $100 million to $300 million.

However, ExxonMobil said that the list of the  takeaways it is providing is not comprehensive, and said that it "may not account for all adjustments and charges required to fully reflect the changes in industry conditions.

Alphabet shares got a  price target hike from an analyst at  Robert W. Baird & Co., on optimistic outlook for the latter part of 2020 and for the next year.

Analyst Colin Sebastian  boosted his price target on the tech behemoth’s shares to $2,000 from $1,725.He also suggested that digital-advertising visibility in 2021 is improving.

Sebastian  has a "favorable outlook” for the next year, as he views an easy year-over-year comparison alongwith an expected improvement in recreation, travel and auto advertisements.

In its new founding round, the company is hoping to raise $125 million in fresh capital by selling 50 million shares, to avoid bankruptcy.

AMC needs at least $750 million of additional liquidity to finance cash requirements through 2021, as suggested by the company.It has been exploring several options, including restructuring of debt.

 “And in the event of such future liquidation or bankruptcy proceeding, holders of our common stock and other securities would likely suffer a total loss of their investment,” it said in the filing.

 

According to the Sensor Tower blog,  Apple’s  App Store and Alphabet’s  Google Play together experienced a +34.5% year-over-year increase in spending on Christmas Day, to $407.6 million.Last year’s year-over-year gain was +17.7%.

Of the total $407.6 million, Apple garnered $278.6 million, while Google Play generated $129 million.

Top category for spending was mobile games, climbing +27% year-over-year to $295.6 million combined for both platforms.

 Wondery, founded in 2016, is the producer of top-rated podcasts like "Dirty John," "Dr. Death," "Business Wars" and "The Shrink Next Door." 

In September, Amazon Music added podcasts to its platform - which means, it will be competing with players like  Spotify and Apple that are already prominent names in the podcasting market.

Terms of the Amazon-Wondery deal weren’t disclosed

According to two analysts, electric carmaker Tesla should be able to reach its goal of 500,000 deliveries for 2020.

Wedbush analyst Daniel Ives wrote in a commentary that Tesla’s  180,000 for 4Q is “line in the sand”, and with  the underlying strength in China as well as a late push in Europe and the U.S., 190,000-200,000 is “well within reach”.This  could enable Tesla to achieve its 500,000 delivery for the year.

Ives maintained his neutral rating on Tesla with a $715 price target.

Credit Suisse analyst Dan Levy expects 183,000 deliveries for this quarter (above what he views as the sell-side consensus of 163,000 and the probable buy-side consensus for 175,000 to 180,000 deliveries).

The stocks have seen small pullbacks in the last month and that may be creating a buying opportunity.

On December 29, Tickeron’s A.I.dvisor generated bullish signals on two steel companies and the confidence levels of those two signals were extremely high.The AI trend prediction tool generated a bullish signal on Nucor Corp. (NUE) and on US Steel (X).